I’ve seen the film by Neasa Ní Cheanáin, Fairytale of Kathmandu, on the gay poet Cathal Ó Searcaigh, and I’m writing a piece for Hot Press about it, which will be published next week. (It’s now on my blog here.) I’m very angry at the way he has been treated. This is just a quick post to say “watch this space”, and for those who are interested in the very complex issues the film raises, follow these bookmarks. I will be keeping track of the story as it grimly unfolds.
Update, February 2009: I finally get to meet and interview him for Hot Press, in his first extended English-language interview. It was published Thursday, 12th February, 2009. More here.
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I’ll be honest; unless the quotes from the newspaper are actually LIES, I’m bloody horrified with the whole thing. If she made up quotes in the film, fine; otherwise it’s all very, very dodgy.
I have no doubt that many will try to make a case that ‘crusing’ for young men in Nepal and Thialand and such places is part of gay culture. I have already heard this argument being used by many who like to be portrayed as ‘liberal’.
However this is an insult to the majority of gay men. Such idea’s are homophobic in spite of the fact that they are often put foward by gay men. Most hetrosexual men do not go to third world countries for sex and neither do most gay men…The vast majority of gay men in their 50’s would not have sex with vulnerable boys from a third world country.
The “very complex issues the film raises” are really quite simple: A fatty old Western man beds beautiful vulnerable young virgin Nepalese “boys” (his term!), because he can, because he has the money, the power, the status, because they are desperate.
This is exploitation at its worst.
For Sharkey to say that ‘the door was always open’, meaning they could have left, is as low as low can get.
I am waiting with bated breath how you will defend this exploitative behaviour!
Sharkey’s mind is twisted like that of most pedophiles (not that he would be classed a pedophile); the amount of Sharkey’s friends, who are so eager to publicly show how their moral compass has gone out of sync’ amazes me.
Oh, perhaps I am really totally wrong here…guess all the recipients of Sharkey’s charitable efforts in the bedroom were really just smitten by the love and sex-appeal of this guy? http://www.writerscentre.ie/images/profiles/osearcaigh.jpg
I found writing the article extremely difficult, I lost sleep over it, aware that this is an issue that arouses not just suspicion and caution, but downright hostility. I am wary that I’m going to be a lightning conductor for people who mistakenly assume I’m defending paedophilia (Ó Searcaigh is NOT a paedophile) and who seem to think that when it comes to sexuality, there are simple answers.
I will post my article to this blog when the documentary goes out on RTÉ, 11th March, so people can comment in an informed way. Or you can buy the next issue of Hot Press, out next week on Thursday 14th. Tickets to both showings of the documentary in the Dublin Film Festival are sold out.
Dermod,
before people can read your forthcoming excuses for the exploitive actions of self-confessed pederast Sharkey, I suggest they have a read of Quentin Fottrell’s Irish Times (9/2/2008) opinion piece on the matter which is like a breath of fresh air after David Norris’ utterly stupid letter in the IT the day before. Quentin begins: “Cathal Ó Searcaigh may be a gay man, but the controversy that surrounds Neasa Ní Chianáin’s ominously entitled documentary, Fairytale of Kathmandu , which has subsequently led to a Garda inquiry, has nothing to do with him being gay.
It has nothing to do with him being a poet. It has nothing to do with him being a nice bloke. It has nothing to do with Puritanism. It has nothing to do with gay culture. Nor does it have anything to do with the quasi homo-erotic image used on the film’s website….” and ends: “This is about trust. It is about charity that should be unconditional, not hunger for something in return. It is about personal responsibility and professional ethics. It is about First World versus Third World. It is about protecting the young and helping the poor.”
Peter , the quote you give sounds just fine but it’s not quite as simple as all that…
There is a serious problem with many who are seen and project themselves as the leaders of Gay Culture and the values they try to impose on that culture..Sharkey is a perfect example of this. Joe Duffy was wondering why Sharkey would be so open in front of a camera crew ,ie was he just very naive etc , but the simple truth is that Sharkey arrogance has put him in the position he is now in. He has seriousley misjudged the true mood of the nation including the majority of it’s gay members.
Dermod, I think you should post your article now so that those of us who wonder how you are going to defend the apparently indefensible get some idea how Ó Searchaigh’s actions in Nepal are not dodgy in the extreme. Irrespective of sexuality or age, is it ok for westerners to have sex with innocent teenagers four decades younger than them using money and gifts to coerce them into sex? I totally agree with Quentin Fotrell on this issue and am dismayed by David Norris’s reaction of boycotting the film. Where is that going to get us?
John,
Firstly, I have to say that people are missing the point here. Accusations have been made in a film. I am very angry at the way those accusations have been made. It is a question of natural justice.
What I think of the actions of the accused, as revealed in the film, I make clear in my article. And everyone can make up their own minds when it is shown on RTÉ.
For copyright reasons, I cannot publish a Hot Press article on my blog until a few weeks after publication date.
“I’m very angry at the way he has been treated.” Alas, poor Dermod, you are just another symptom. A symptom of the crass commercialisation of, oh, almost everything. Sexuality. Morality. Charity. And now your own hissy fit of indignation. Indignation tempered with a keen eye on copyright laws and The Man with the cheque book. Very rock’n'roll. You’ve already rendered whatever you might have to say irrelevant. Inadequate. Insincere. Subject to terms and conditions. The value of your opinion won’t go up, just down, down, down… Unlike your opinion of yourself, I suspect.
With the amount of malice and hate that is going around, I feel my skeleton should be hanging in the breeze here.
My crime was expressing anger at a film, putting out a few bookmarks for those interested in the story, and pointing out that I’ve written an article in a magazine if anyone wants to buy it.
I was annoying Stokes for years by publishing my articles on the web at the same time as he was publishing them in HP. He was right to ask me to stop doing it. It’s only fair.
It’s amazing (not to mention, on a personal level, shocking) how someone can turn their decision not to spend €3.50 on a magazine into grounds for a lip-smackingly sadistic character assassination.
Justin: Whatever about the Ó Searcaigh issue, it is ENTIRELY reasonable not to publish the article online until after it’s been published in the magazine. This is standard practice. Every author who duplicates their articles in their blog that I can think of does it (offhand, Stephen Fry, Ben Goldacre, Daniel Rutter).
Dermod,
my commiseration. I feel a little bit sorry for anybody whose case is taken up by Eoghan Harris (today in the Sunday Independent, http://www.independent.ie/opinion/analysis/trial-by-media-mob-fails-to-address–every-moral-issue-1291219.html). In a typical “look at me, I am the greatest” article by Eoghan, brimming with self-righteous stupidity, Harris fore-mostly elevates himself to be the courageous defender of the innocent mob victim Searcaigh. Your argument, about the film maker missing the “sexual nuances” was just too sweet not to be taken aboard by Harris:
“Dermod Moore of Hotpress has seen the film, however, and he subjects it to a severe critique in the current issue. Moore believes Neasa Ni Chianain has no feel for the sexual nuances of the issues involved and uses the word “honeytrap” to describe how O Searcaigh is depicted.
Furthermore, having been to that city, Moore makes it clear that, contrary to most media reports –which also maliciously keep driving the ages of the young men downwards — Kathmandu is not some kind of innocent version of Kinnegad in the 1950s.”
Hm. I’ve never been to Nepal.
As a regular visitor to Asia, I am disgusted with Cathal Ó Searcaigh. These people are extremely poor, innocent & in awe of the educated wealthy westerner. Mr Ó Searcaigh took full advantage of this. I wonder would he be doing “so much good” for the people of Nepal if he hadn’t found it so easy to have sex with the vulnerable young boys there. In my opinion, he’s no better than the likes of Gary Glitter, albeit more educated & cunning. Lock him up and throw away the key I say! And for all those people who are supporting him and saying he has done no wrong – they are just as bad.
FAIR TRADE SEX TOURISM
A poem for Irish poets, who should be ashamed
of themselves for supporting sex tourism, but probably aren’t.
Big stone falls into small Irish poetical pond!
One of our number has been having sex.
(No, that fact is not the stone.
That’s merely a ripple)
He’s been having sex with young men in Nepal.
He’s a sex tourist, dammit!
Not good, not good.
Letters to papers.
Matter of ethics.
But there again on the other hand.
Milton was a PR man for Cromwell.
Great art is above and beyond
These piffling details of the weakness of humanity.
Et cet era.
And bear in mind, he was also teaching them
Useful stuff (apart from sex),
Reading riting ritmetic and so forth.
It could be said, admitted, alright, it was sex tourism,
But it was Fair Trade Sex Tourism.
And anyway, none of this gets to the point.
The real question remains unanswered.
Was he having sex with them in Irish or English?
If the former, the question of grants and subsidies arise.
There are definite forms to fill, proper procedures,
Arts administrators to keep in jobs.
If none of these things are done properly
Well then the Irish poetical pond would be chaotic.
Might even be poetry.
Couldn’t have that.
All that relevance to reality.
After watching the programme last night, I think the issue is clear. Cathal Ó Searcaigh exploited a great many innocent, naive boys (it would have been no different if they were girls!). Although the boys featured in the programme were 16 or over, they obviously were more innocent than their european counterparts, and in many cases he took their virginity. Having sex with a prostitute who understands and consents the sexual bargain in exchange for money (or bikes) is one thing, Having sex with 50-60 children and destroying their innocence is the behaviour of a sexual predator.
Don’t shoot the messenger! Having finally seen the documentary, I can see where the accusations of bias come from but I don’t think they outweigh the ‘Fair Trade Sex Tourism’ of the poet. He was extremely naive to allow the film makers to film him in potentially incriminating situations and not to ask to see the film before it was produced and approve it.
The clergy circled the wagons and closed ranks to protect itself when the sex abuse scandals broke; now we have the artistic community and, to my great disappointment, David Norris, a man whose intelligence and integrity I have always respected, doing likewise, even going so far as to advocate censorship and shamlessly playing the homophobic card to protect one of its members who was patently engaging in the exploitation of vulnerable young men. In doing so they show themselves to be just as deluded as Cathal Ó Searcaigh who, it must be said willingly allowed himself to be filmed and indeed appeared to revel in the adulation as he strutted around the streets surrounded by his adoring acolytes. Watching the film it was obvious that, like Michael Jackson, he needs psychiatric help because his sexuality is in some way warped and stunted. Incidentally, why was it always boys that he helped? Are there no poor Nepalese girls in need of education? The whole thing was creepy in the extreme. Somehow I doubt if he would get very far in a western country buying sexual favours from seventeen year olds who would soon tell him what he could do with his bicycles and ice-cream cones.
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